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A North Carolina woman who spent her final days trying to find homes for the 34 rescued cats and dog that lived with her may be resting more easily now.

All but one of the animals — Lilly, shown above — have been adopted, WRAL reports.

Susan Lee of Wake Forest, an independent animal rescuer, died earlier this year after a battle with cancer, but not before putting out a plea to family, friends and the public to adopt the dogs and cats she called ”Susan’s Sweethearts.”

Mike And Doreen Smith adopted Bruiser, an energetic 80-pound dog with one blue eye and one brown eye. 

Ryan Wood, who heard about Susan’s Sweethearts from a friend, adopted Buddy. “He was unlike any of the other dogs. It’s hard to explain. It was love,” Wood said.

Karen Croom, a friend of Lee who promised her she’d get all of the animals adopted, said only one dog remains — a black Lab named Lilly, who, while good with people, is looking for a home with no other pets.

(Photo: Susan’s Sweethearts)

A Phoenix area animal advocate plans to tie herself to a tree Saturday in hopes of raising money to provide her shelter with air conditioned dog houses.

Erica Wellman, a caregiver with Friends for Life Animal Rescue in Gilbert, hopes the demonstration will bring awareness to the plight of dogs left tied up outside in Arizona’s heat.

Temperatures this week in Arizona are expected to reach 116, according to the Arizona Republic.

The non-profit, all-volunteer, no-kill shelter currently holds 21 dogs, but it is forced to rescue fewer in the summer because of space limitations. With air-conditioned dog houses, it would be able to keep dogs outside, and have room for more.

The group recently purchased three air-conditioned doghouses from a company in Alabama at a cost of $5,800.

The non-profit group hopes the “Erica Unchained” fundraiser, starting at 8 a.m., will raise at least a $1,000.

“I can feel what it is to be a dog for a day and see how hard it is for them to handle it,” Wellman said.

Wellman will be tied to a tree with a short leash attached to her waist. A thermostat board will keep track of donations as they come in. Wellman will allow herself to take a water and potty break with every $200 donated.

“I’m hoping to get the money fast so I can come inside,” she said.

We don’t really know that Jan Van Dusen is crazy, we just suspect a tinge of that might be involved — and it could be good crazy or bad crazy – when someone invites 70 stray cats into their home.

Van Dusen, 59, is a former family-law attorney who lives alone (not counting the cats) in Oakland, Calif., where she’s a volunteer and foster care provider for an organization called Fix Our Ferals, which traps, neuters and cares for stray and feral cats.

In her 2004 tax return, Van Dusen deducted $12,068 in expenses related to caring for foster cats in her modest home – food, veterinarian bills, cat litter, paper towels, garbage bags, and a portion of her utility bills.

The IRS, as you might guess, said no, declaring the costs she incurred caring for strays as “nondeductible personal expenses,” as opposed to charitable contributions.

Van Dusen — and we’re sure all 70 cats agreed — didn’t think that was right and contested the IRS decision.

In 2009, the case wound up in Tax Court, where Van Dusen represented herself because she couldn’t afford a lawyer.

“If it came down to helping a cat with a medical problem or saving for retirement, I would spend on the cat’s care—as will a lot of rescue workers,” she told the Wall Street Journal, which carried a story Saturday about her victory.

According to the Journal, it was also a victory for animal rescue volunteers across the country, and volunteers in general. There are more than 1.5 million IRS-recognized charities, the article said, and the ruling makes clear that unreimbursed expenses incurred by volunteers working for them are deductible.

Van Dusen learned she had won her case earlier this month. “I was stunned,” she said. “It feels great to have established this precedent.”

She said her pretrial dealings with the IRS were “intimidating.” Once in court, she said, the agency’s lawyers “tried to portray me as a crazy cat lady.” The judge, Richard Morrsion, patiently allowed her to state her case.

“He had to go through all these receipts from Costco and ask questions like, ‘What were these paper towels used for?’ ”

Under his ruling, Van Dusen was allowed to deduct most of some bills and half of others for care of the feral cats. The judge stopped short of granting her total deduction because she didn’t have a valid letter from the charity acknowledging her volunteer work.

The IRS declined to comment on the case. It has 90 days to contest the ruling in  federal appeals court.

(Photo: By Michael Mullady; source: Wall Street Journal)

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When Kathy Wilkes-Myers of Love Me Tender Animal Rescue found a Rottweiler on the side of a highway in Tennessee, she immediately got the feeling the dog belonged to somebody — she wasn’t as timid and untrusting as most abandoned dogs.

“I could just tell right away she was somebody’s baby. She just didn’t act like a stray dog to me,” said Wilkes-Myers, who found the dog a few months ago, emaciated and drinking from a drainage ditch along the road.

Wilkes-Myers suspected there was more to the dog’s story, and began doing some detective work.

She returned to where she found the dog, and found the first clues - broken glass and tail lights. Not far away she found a pile of personal items — a toothbrush, comb, razor, and a candle with “Michelle” written on it — that had been gathered, apparently by the dog.

“It was like she was sleeping with them – or waiting with them,” Wilkes-Myers told Steve Hartman of CBS News.

It was then she remembered driving by a bad accident on the same stretch of highway, two weeks earlier.  A car had flipped over and landed on the side of the road, crunched up so badly she was sure there were no survivors.

But it led her to wonder — might the dog have been in the car?

When the highway patrol told her the names of the victims — including a mother named Michelle, the pieces came together.

Ella apparently spent  13 days scavenging for food along the highway – and 13 nights bedding down with whatever she could find that smelled like her lost family, Hartman reported.

Wilkes-Myers also found out that all five members of the family survived the crash. After two weeks believing that their dog, Ella, had died, the Kellys got the good news and were reunited with their dog.

Because of their medical expenses, the Kelly family has had to relocate to temporary housing that doesn’t allow dogs, but Wilkes-Myers has promised to keep Ella for as long as they need.